This morning, February already. Wow, it just seems like it just blew on by. It's February. In January, it's not an easy month. See, we almost went to war with Iran, which is Persia. We had major volcanic eruptions all in one day around the world that followed by some earthquakes. We had Australia catch on fire and burn almost extensively and exclusively. We have Trump started peace talks with Israel. Palestinians and a deadly virus that started in China that's now in 27 countries With his first death being reported outside of that country here this morning. And so wow, you know 2020 is off to a kickstart and that's some of the things that the Bible warns about and talks about and so there's a few things that's going on so we're living in exciting times we're living in times to where Now we need to be paying attention. We need to have the Bible in one hand and interpreting and reading and seeing what's going on. It's like, is this something? Is that it? I don't want to be the guys that were like alive in Jesus' day saying, I never even considered, could you be the Christ? You know, and so they weren't paying attention. And he says that we need to be paying attention, understanding. He says you can discern the weather, surely you can discern the time. So the Bible says, This is the kind of the things that we'd be seeing that we should be expecting. It calls it birth pangs. It's like, these aren't it, but these are things that are kind of leading up to it, you know, where it increase and things will get worse and worse, things on a global scale that'll happen to try to wake us up to show us that there's a horrible time to about be delivered on earth. And that's the seven year tribulation that the Bible talks about in the book of Revelation. And wow, we are alive here now for a time, this time. But you don't have to be there for the horrible event. The tribulation is a horrible event. It's an event that Jesus says is the worst time on earth. You know, that he has to shorten it, you know, and pray that all these different things to keep it. He says it's horrible. You don't want to be here. We don't have to be here. He made a way of escape for us. We have an escape boat. We have a rescuer. We have salvation. We have Jesus Christ. And if you repent of your sins and trust in him, he says he'll keep you from that time. He'll keep you from that testing that comes upon the whole earth. And so I think it's one of the reasons why Revelation's here. It's a warning to show us when we can read ahead what it's going to be like, how horrible it's going to be, and to motivate us to say, I don't want to be here. Is there any way to escape? Is there any way to be done with this? So we seek the Lord, find the Lord, repent of our sins, trust in Him to save us, and we don't have to worry about that, let alone we get to be on His team. So He's just trying to, it's one of the things He uses to draw all men unto Himself. We are in the book of Revelation and here at Cornerstone on Sunday morning, we take a book of the Bible and we go through it. We do what's called expository preaching. We take one book of the Bible and we go through it a verse at a time. We read through it and then we usually kind of use the Bible to commentate on the Bible and to understand it and try to explain it and then see how it fits for us. And so we're in chapter 14, which follows chapter 13. Chapter 13 is a very dark chapter that had the beast in it. It had the false prophet in it. It had the image of the beast that they made come alive and caused men to worship it. It had the mark of the beast. You know, the one thing that at least, if anybody knows anything about the Bible, they know 666, mark of the beast, and so that was in there. And then we see after that at the beginning of chapter 14, 144,000 victors. Untouched by the beast evil schemes that he has laid out upon the world to try to deceive men To try to kill Christians to try to persecute those who repented and trust in Jesus Christ We see that every one of them make it we have all them standing on the hilltop there with Jesus Christ These aren't supernatural people. They are men like us, verse four. So Revelation 14, verse four. These are they which were not defiled with women, for they are virgins. These are they which follow the Lamb, whethersoever he goeth. These were redeemed from among men, being the first fruits unto God and unto the Lamb. These are just men, the first fruits of salvation. during the Tribulation. So that's one of the keys we look at to show that the Church isn't there. We've looked at several throughout the text that show the Church isn't here for this time period. He never mentions the Church. The Book of Revelation talks about the Church. As a matter of fact, Chapter 1 mentions the Church several times. Chapter 2, Chapter 3 is all about the Church. In chapter 4 he says, come up hither, and we think we see the church in heaven there through the 24 elders that are representative of the church. And the rest of the time, you know, we're not mentioned until the bride of Christ shows up again towards the end of the book. And so we're not here because we are pre-tribulational view of the rapture. That means we think that the rapture will happen before the tribulation, taking the church out before God pours His wrath out on the earth. We have a bunch of key texts that kind of show us that, because God says we aren't destined for wrath. That the gates of hell do not prevail against us. You know, we're not here for that. But we are his witnesses here and now. But these, this group, becomes the first fruit of salvation. So these are the first ones saved after the rapture of the church. All the believers are taken off the earth. We believe that's everyone who's repentant and trusted in Christ. We know the dead in Christ rise first. Their body is resurrected. Then we which are alive and remain are changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye. And we go up and we meet the Lord in the air. We don't have to taste death. You know, we get to fly up into the air. Our body is changed into a body that will become immortal. The one that does not ever have to fear dying again, doesn't have to fear sinning. You know, it's just, it's made a powerful body. 1 Corinthians 15 tells us all about it. And so we get transformed. We go up to be with Him. I believe when we're in Heaven we have what's called the Bema Seat Judgment. We go through or wherever we're rewarded for the things we do in the earth. It's not about salvation. We are saved We have been transformed we are there It's about what you did in your body while you're on earth, you know for the for the service of the king So like an awards banquet, let's think of it that way, you know, it says they'll try our works, you know Then whatever tries it by fire, whatever's left, you know, what? Hey stubble burn away, but gold silver precious stone whatever remains, you know becomes our reward that we can then cast at his feet and out of gratitude for what the Savior's done for us, but on the earth We're gone And so there's no representative here on the earth. And so there will be a treaty or some kind of covenant that is confirmed with the Antichrist between world leaders. So that's why when we have a president or anybody who goes over to Israel and they start talking peace, they start talking treaties, they start talking covenants and things that we're always kind of like, you know, I'll date myself here by the E.F. Hutton reference, but there used to be a commercial when E.F. Hutton talks, everybody would go, ooh, and they would lean in on these commercials. When we see those things, all the prophetic world will lean forward and start to listen. What's this? What's going on? What's on the bargaining table? What's happening? Seems like the big chip this time is temple, temple, temple. We're going to build this temple. And we know during the seven-year tribulation, there is a temple in Israel that the Antichrist defiles. And so all the talk of this temple coming back and being rebuilt is one of the key pieces that's kind of left for that last seven-year time period. We see God drawing all things back. He took a nation of Israel that was scattered in 70 AD all over the face of the earth to the point they were everywhere. There was none in their land. Matter of fact, it was illegal. There was laws against them being back in their land. These begin to draw them back, and they're in the land, and they're in Jerusalem. Jerusalem is acknowledged as the capital. All these things showing themselves, establishing themselves there. Their enemies are back in their places. We've just changed the names on them. Like I said, Iran, we had a conflict with them, but it's actually Persia is what they're known of in the Old Testament. And we have all those around them there that are all shaking their sabers, you know, starting to start things. And so we look for that kind of time where it'll come. But at the beginning of that, after that peace treaty, there's 144,000 that get sealed with the seal of God, that God takes 12,000 from each of the 12 tribes of Israel, and he says, you will be my witnesses. And they go forth, and they're like supernatural in the sense that they're like Apostle Paul. The Apostle Paul was just zealous, had a zeal for the Lord, who went about and did not care about what harm might come his way. He'd be marching to one city, and they're like, Paul, I was warned in a vision that you're going to be hurt there. And he's like, yeah, I know. Paul, in this city, they're going to try to kill you. Yeah, I know. But he goes, and he takes the gospel, and he preaches the gospel. And they would abuse him. But he would supernaturally come out of it because God had a plan. God was using this man to spread the good news of the gospel of Christ. And so I have 144,000 of those. And we see them that no matter what the Antichrist does, no matter what the beast does, they survive. And they are there. And they are the redeemed out of men. They are the first fruits. These were God's witnesses on earth. Because God always has a witness. God always has someone who's going to testify about him. He always has someone who will speak up, who will stand up. We've seen in the Old Testament, like Elisha and Elijah being like, oh, I'm the only one. And God's like, no, you're not. I have 3,000 witnesses that are still here, that you're there. You're not alone. So we're not alone. They are not alone. He leaves a witness. He gives them 144,000. But Jesus says this time will be like no other. Like I said, he even says that somehow those days are shortened. But God is not willing that any should perish, but that all would come to repentance. I love that about our Savior. He's not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. He does what he can to try to win the souls of men. So he sends, he takes us out, so the church is gone, but things we've done for Christ last, right? The Bibles that we've marked up, the tracts that we've written, things that we've left here and there. Come to our church. I got a chart on the wall for them. There's a tribulation chart over here. Kind of show you some things that are going on. Look through my desk. Rummage through there. You know, whatever our Bibles, if the rapture happens during the church time, we'll be up here. All of our marked Bibles will be in one spot. You know, kind of pulling these things out. I have books in the office that they can go and look through. DVDs and things like that. There's videos on YouTube. There's videos on blog posts. There's all the things we talked. And so they have all those resources. What were the Christians saying? They'll go after that. They'll look. And our testimony will have an effect on those afterwards. So he has us as a witness. He has 144,000 that he pulls out as supernatural witnesses in the sense that they are men, but they go around and the beast is not able to touch them. So they are impervious to whatever his plans and plots are. Plus, whoever they convert, He has them out witnessing. So, you know, if you hear about the good news of Jesus Christ and you find out that you can be saved and you don't have to worry about hell, you go and you tell someone else. There's boldness that comes upon you when your sins have been forgiven. When all of a sudden, you know, that you are at odds with God and now you're a friend of God, you want to tell people, you want to say your sins can be forgiven as well. It's like knowing, you know, when we know that there's something good, like at a restaurant on Wednesday we're talking about in Psalms, We're in a restaurant, and we're like, oh man, you gotta try the chimichanga down here at Mi Pueblo's, or we gotta try this over there. You gotta go to this restaurant, man, that restaurant, they have the best pizza. You wanna tell people about it. David said in the Psalms, taste the Lord and see that he is good. It's like, man, he's the best thing going, and so when you have your sins forgiven, you wanna tell others. And so you go and you wanna tell, you wanna share, and so those converts will talk to other people, and those converts will talk to other people, much like how the church functions today. Only thing is during a time when there's much opposition, But here at chapter 14, we're at the midpoint of a seven-year tribulation. And the Bible is very specific in that it divides this in two halves. There's the first half and the second half. And at the midpoint, there's something that happens that's called the abomination of desolation. Matthew 24 tells us about it. Jesus points it out to us. He tells us, if you want to understand this, matter of fact, there's a commentary within the scripture, within parentheses that says, whosoever wants to read, if no one understands, go to Daniel the prophet. So Daniel chapter 9, we read about that. We have history. Hanukkah is celebrated, and it's about Antiochus Epiphanes, this man who was like the beast who came into Israel, who took out all their things of worship, and he set up Zeus as a god to be worshipped in the temple, and how then the Jews rose up over him. He was a type of Antichrist, and so Hanukkah is a time celebrating when they were recleansing, putting these things back, and so it's kind of a pattern of what the Antichrist would be like. And so we have that type in shadow. And that is there. And so it's something here in the midpoint that he says, this is when you know you're in the middle. And he tells them, if you see this thing happen where the anti-Christ goes in and sets himself up as God, run into the woods, run out into the wilderness, go hide, get off grid, you know, go and hide. And then he talks about what a difficult time it's going to be that last three and a half years. So he is out there. And Jesus is warned. We're in that midpoint here at chapter 14. And we've having to deal with these things on earth. There's a beast. who's going around trying to show himself as God by doing supernatural things, who's claiming that he is God. We have a false prophet who tries to back it up by saying, oh, this is God, and I'm his man, and he performs miracles. They're both liars and deceivers. There's a fake resurrection where the beast has a deadly wound to his head. He has something that happens to his head, and then he comes alive again, and there's something that makes all the world wonder after the beast. Like, who is he? What's he like? He's come back. There's false miracles that happen. Supernatural powers on display where the false prophet's able to call down fire from heaven and consume people and things on the earth. Where we have an image, some kind of graven image that has given life. And we've talked about that a few weeks ago, what that might be like. Who knows? But supernatural powers on display with a world, this world that says, if there's a God and there's a God out there, surely he would show me. Do something and show me. Seeing is believing. The Bible says that's not true. You can be deceived. The eyes can be deceived. Watch a magician. He can show you some stuff and you don't leave a scratch in your head, but he's deceiving you and he tells you it's called an illusion. Illusion means it's fake. You know, this is fake. I didn't really make someone disappear. I really didn't make that card disappear. I deceived you into thinking that. I have practiced for hours to be able to do this. And so there's a deception that goes on and yet these guys are doing something where they're tricking men. This image comes to life. They call down fire. They're demanding worship. That should give you our first clue. The pressure of the world is to take the mark. You know, you can't buy or sell without it. You can't participate in world commerce. You have to pledge your allegiance to the beast, and so they want you to take this. Or you're going to starve. You can't have it. You can't have a job. You have to quit your thing. No one's going to hire you. You're unworkable in today's society unless you have this. Matter of fact, you have the pressure of, demand loyalty to the beast, or you can't buy or sell or trade or have any kind of commerce, or we'll kill you, we'll behead you. We see that that's the mode of execution that they use. We'll chop your head off if you refuse to conform. And so, wow, it's free worship of the beast. No, this is a pressure, there's a fear that's put upon mankind because of this. And so, these are desperate times, and desperate times require drastic and desperate measures. And so the church's great commission is to go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. Mark ends with that. Jesus' words to the church, his army. He gives us the great marching order. Go into all the world and preach the gospel. And so we try. He tells us to start with our Jerusalem first, then Samaria, then the outermost parts of the earth. And so we do our part around here to preach the gospel. We take on missionaries to take the gospel to other places. praying for the Burleys as they are preparing people and taking the gospel knowledge to New York, to Miami, and to other places as they teach others to share it. We have missionaries in Haiti. We have missionaries in Turkey. We have missionaries at camp to our young people. We have missionaries in our schools preaching the gospel through the Great Adventure Club. We have the Lord's Locker. We have RU. We have Gatekeeper Cinema. Cornerstone's involved in a lot of things trying to make sure the gospel is out and the gospel is being spread. That's good. We're supposed to. It's the church's job. But if the church is gone, you know, who's preaching this message? So God sends these 144,000 messengers, 12,000 out of each tribe. But because the veil between the natural and the supernatural has been torn asunder, and these things are going on where you have the beast making these proclamations that he is God, and the false prophet doing these miracles, making fire come down, and making inanimate objects come alive, God shows his hand. in a big and bold way, and that's Revelation 14, verse six, where we are ready. So Revelation 14, verse six, and he says, and I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation and kindred and tongue and people, saying with a loud voice, fear God and give glory to him, for the hour of judgment has come, and worship him that made heaven and earth and the sea and the fountains and the waters. God sends an angel to fly in the sky and proclaim a new gospel. No, that's not what it says. An everlasting gospel, right? The same gospel, the same thing. How do people in the tribulation get saved? Same way you and I do. How did Adam and Eve get saved? Same way you and I do. You also know it's the same thing. It's the everlasting gospel. Adam and Eve got saved the same way as Moses, as Jonah, as Gideon, as David. As Peter, as James, and John, as Brian, or Elaine, or Carl, or Robbie, or Jesse, or all these things, Dave, Kim, Gerald, all of them. All the however we got saved is the same way that they get saved. Same gospel. Repenting of their sins and trusting Jesus Christ to save them. That's how I got saved. Transformed my life. Same thing for them. Same thing then. Same gospel that the angel preaches at the worst time in history, going through the midpoint of the tribulation, just before God's about to send out his wrath without mixture. That means he's not going to water it down. He's no longer going to cut it. He's going to pour his wrath out on the earth, unrestrained. And just before he does that, our God of mercy says, I'm about ready to pour out my wrath. And he's been holding his hand back as his son was being Executed on the cross with the hands of men. They beat him, they tortured him, they drove nails in his hands and feet, spear up through his side, crown of thorns around his head, mocking him, plucking out his beard, abusing him. He had to hold back the angels that would have come down and defended him. And he's been doing that. Many times we're saying, God, where are you when you hear about an abuse case of a child? Or you hear about something having a murder. Torture things that go on around the world genocide and all these different thing mass murders war and all that we're like God Why haven't you judged the earth? He's like I'm wanting to But I'm a God of mercy. I'm a God of compassion. I hold my hand back, but there's one day when he finally says enough enough And he sends his wrath down on the earth because our God is a God of love and compassion, a God who says, I'm not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, that whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved, that I have died for the sins of mankind, that Jesus Christ didn't come to save the righteous, but the lost, He came to repent. He came to save the sinners. If sinners would just see their sinfulness, repent of their sinful ways, turn and trust in the finished work of Jesus Christ and not in their own righteousness, not in their good things, not in their good works, not in their good deeds, but in the finished work of Jesus Christ, that we lay aside our righteousness, not just our works as filthy rag, but the things we see as righteousness, count them as filthy rags, because God does. He sees our righteousness as filthy rags. Cast them aside and say, Deanna, come to your empty hand. I can do nothing. Save me. He says, I want salvation for anyone. I want it available to anyone. I want them to know and understand it. So God, being the all-compassion God that He is, gives them this one last chance. Yes, he sends 144,000 to preach for three and a half years, and will preach throughout the last three and a half years. Snakes bite him, fall into the fire, just like with Paul. They're impervious to bullets, maybe, and poisons. Traps and snares, we talked about last week. We looked at a psalm, I think it was Psalm 91, that's kind of their singing psalm. Also the word of mouth, all those are there, but he also sends us angels. He sends us angels to the Jews. No, it doesn't say that. To all those that dwell on the earth. You know, verse six, and I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth and to every nation and kindred and tongue and people. Every tongue, every kindred, every nation, all people, everywhere hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. They hear it. They understand it. It is perfectly spoken in their name, in their language. There's no translation issue. There is nothing that goes on. There's nothing where they're like, I didn't understand, or I didn't understand what you meant by this, or I didn't understand what you meant by that. Thank you, Mike. But the Bible is consistent in the world is being pressed to submit to the beast. At the midpoint of the tribulation, the world has high pressure on them. Talk about peer pressure. You can't buy or sell. You can't do anything. Talk about political pressure. You must join into this system. You must join into what we are doing or you cannot participate in this world. Talk about just even the practical pressure. You can't buy or sell. You can't do anything. Can you imagine the pressure of that? What if this was the day? What if this was the time? There's a movie I saw that played a pivotal role in my salvation called A Thief in the Night in the 70s. And churches would get together and they would show it. And it was the old movie, you know, with the projector. Get going. And they put it up on there. And it terrified me. It terrified me. It was about the rapture. The rapture happens. The first half of it, you know, shows these crazy young 70 guys with bell bottoms and big sideburns, you know, grooving around, doing fun things. You know, at this fair and all this. And preachers preaching to them. The gospel tent at the fair. And maybe they get some tracks and things. But they kind of mock it and make fun of it. This girl's boyfriend repents, trusts in Christ, and tries to get her, but she's not ready. She's like, no, she doesn't see it this way. And then she wakes up, and his razor's laying in the sink vibrating. And she starts running around, and on the news is that all these people have just disappeared. It's a whole thing about her being persecuted and her being left behind and the world was there and it scared me. And they have a second movie called A Distant Thunder where the beast men have caught all these people and they have them in a sanctuary much like this and everybody's sitting in the church and then they have a guy who's in the one world government suit who stands up front and he just very softly will name three or four names, you know, Bill, Lisa. Tim please come forward they come up and they take him out back some of them come screaming back in and they sign something others stay outside you never see him again and the whole time these people are talking about events going on throughout the movie and you're wondering what's in that door that scares them and that makes some come back in and sign and take the mark and they finally get to the lead character of this girl they take her outside and there's a guillotine And they're about ready to chop her head off for not wanting to take the mark. Man, there is a fear in that. There's a peer pressure. There's this delay, and this movie does a good job of kind of showing that, you know, this pressure that is there that builds. What are you going to do with these public executions that happen? And so, yeah, there's a fear of death. There's a fear of death because of the executions. There's a fear death because of starvation There's the fear of being an outcast not being like everybody else that's in the world because everybody's taking the mark and everyone's worshiping it Do you want to be the guy on the outside? You wouldn't want to be those people. Do you you bigoted narrow-minded individual? We say see tastes of that today. It's being floated today You know with the social score That goes around to China that's coming to the United States and being floated. We have a lot of right-wing and political people that have been denied any kind of commerce, you know, stopped from PayPal. They're not allowed to have bank accounts at some banks, that they demonetize them on YouTube to the point where they even pull all their channels. They try to, you're not allowed to have a Twitter account. You're not allowed to say this. You're not allowed to say that. I think it just happened this week to an anti-abortion group, you know, promoting pro-life. No, that's hate speech. You can't say it. You know, we take it down. And so, yeah, we're being, trying to be forced and then put into this model. We see foretastes of that here and now, so we are close. So we can understand this fear, but we're to stand up. We're not to be fearful. Jesus tells us, fear not, right? You know, greater is he that was in you than he that is in the world. And where you might be afraid, he is not afraid. And we put our faith and trust in him, and he'll give you the strength, and he'll give you the strength on that day. And so, that's why we want to study. We want to know him. fear of being an outcast. The fear of the beast's power or the false prophet's power, the image, whatever his power is because it says he causes them to take this mark or be executed. Let alone there's this false sense that the beast portrays by using Closed-circuit television by using the internet and the collection of data and big data and all the algorithms that are out there that can the same kind of algorithm That's out there saying like oh you want a jacuzzi now every time you look on anything We have an ad for a jacuzzi by this jacuzzi. That's all it is it follows you across platforms. It's on your phone It's on your computer even on your TV. I don't know what you're talking about something the other day something really really weird and But I can watch YouTube on our TV. I got a smart TV. Oh, and what were all the ads? It was whatever this weird thing we were talking about. Now, all of a sudden, it's the ads on my TV. It's right there. Am I paranoid? Yeah, a little bit. Because I think they're spying on me. I think things are going on. And I take notice when I see there. Like, what were the chances of all these things? So yeah, there's this false impression that the beast and the Antichrist are able to portray that's like they're omniscient. It almost seems like they are all knowing. We know your history. We know where you go. We know what you do, because we have it all written down and we have a computer that can interpret it. There's a false omnipotence because they seem all powerful. They seem that it's all there and it's something that makes you then fearful of them and you want to have some kind of regard for them and it seems like I have to conform or how am I going to survive in this world? And so, man, it's there. But this angel stays with the starting point that the Bible does as it proclaims the message of the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It says this in verse 7, the angel starts with saying with a loud voice, fear God. Don't fear the beast. Don't fear the Antichrist. Don't fear his image. Don't fear the one world political system, whatever it might be. Don't be that. Fear God. Fear him first. And that's what the Bible tells us. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Once you understand that he is the creator, that he is the maker, and the angel goes on to say that, that he is the one, look at the rest of verse 7, about the middle point, and worship him that made heaven and earth and the sea and the fountains and the waters. It comes back to the creation, not evolution, not whatever science is putting out there, not aliens, not anything else. We were made by God. He's the creator fear him. He's the one who made us. He's the one who makes the rules for us We don't make our own rules. We make we got to follow his rule fear. God is the beginning of wisdom Jesus warns us fear not them which can kill the body But are not able to kill the soul, but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell That's what Jesus tells us. You want to fear someone, you fear the God of this world. You fear the God that if you reject him, that he will leave you in your sins and you'll have to suffer and pay for your sin against him throughout all eternity. You need to give glory to him, that's what the angel says. Verse seven, saying with a loud voice, fear God and give glory to him. That's submission. You need to submit to him, submit to God. You have to humble yourself. That's the whole part of salvation, when you finally come to the end of yourself, where you realize you need to You can't do it yourself. And you need help. You're at the end of yourself. You're so low that you have to look up to see the bottom of a dime. You're like, I am at the end of myself. I have nothing. I'm poor. I'm bankrupt. I have nothing to offer. Save me, Jesus. That's why I'm so glad the Bible says, look unto him all ye at the end of the earth, and you shall be saved. It doesn't say do anything. I can't move myself. I can't climb a mountain. I can't swim an ocean. I can't do all that. But when I'm at my lowest point, when I'm at my weakest point, when I was down on my knees in front of him, you know what I could do? I could look and live. I could move my eyes. I could look upon Jesus. I could see him. Look and live, my brother. Live, look and live. We sing about this. This is the Bible. Look to him. and have salvation, that's submission, that's looking unto him, that's looking for him who has your hope. So we have to humble ourselves. Repent of our sins, see our sins as exceedingly sinful, turn our back on them and trust in the creator, trust in the maker, trust in the one who's made all things, the God of this universe. The angel also stresses the urgency of his message. He says, do it now. Repent now because the hour of his judgment has come. Let's see, it's right there, verse 7. Saying with a loud voice, fear God, give glory to him, for the hour of his judgment has come, and worship him. The hour of judgment has come. This is another proof text that the church isn't going to be here during this time. I said earlier, you know, preaching the gospel is our job. It's the church's job. It's what he left for us to do. So this shows us that we aren't here. He's having an angel do our job. It doesn't happen. We are to do our job. He's counting on you and I to do our job of sharing the gospel. Because this is a desperate time, desperate measure, the church isn't here. He sends an angel to do that. He sends an angel to proclaim this truth. Now, does that mean angels aren't interacting with us today? Yeah, they are. But the Bible tells us as far as the church age, we entertain angels unaware. They are active. They are a bold part of it. We are seeing the veil torn back. We are understanding that we are into some supernatural warfare as the darkness of our leaderships gets proclaimed to us as they tear back the veil. We see how deep, dark, and depraved they are. Jeffrey Epstein. and the things that are going on there, those are caught in this pedophilia, caught in perverse different sexual things, cannibalism and stuff at the highest levels in our governments and things that are going on, trying to be suppressed and kept down but leaking forth, saying who they are, going to these spirit cooking events and doing all these different things with these elite dark people and doing it. It's being revealed to us. And so we know and we understand and we can see it. But they are active here now. But usually, If we've had any interaction with them, I can suspect that I've had sometimes. I know my mother's had. I've known a few others. It's one of these, when you get done, you're kind of like, wait a minute. How'd that happen? Do you think that guy might have been, or do you think those people, and do you think that circumstance could have been this? With missionaries, you hear missionary stories where they're like, the missionary, where the cannibals were gonna come eat the missionary and his family that night, and as they stood on this bridge, ready to face their accusers, you know, coming at them to eat them, and then all the tribe's been turned away, and then after they repent and come to Christ, the missionary's asking them, like, hey, that one night you were coming to come eat my family, kill us and eat us, why would you, you turned away, and they're like, Oh, that whole army that was behind you. We're going to have no army. And so, you know, we are unaware, you know, but they are there moving and working, showing themselves in miraculous ways. I wonder how many of our ladies that work downtown, you know, don't have some angel that's there by them keeping the other people away, saying, no, this is mine, leave them alone. And so, and other things, you know. My wife says my angel's probably going to be mad at me because, you know, why are you driving on ball tires? You know, why are you doing all these things, you know, all this stuff that goes on. But having someone guarding and protecting and watching, they are there. But God is so compassionate, it causes him to act out of the norm of what we are used to, let alone doesn't matter about us, we're going. And he spreads the gospel. Like I said, we are at the midpoint, it's getting ready to turn bad. God's just about to send his wrath, and so he sends an angel to proclaim. Can you imagine? I've tried to imagine. He says it descends into every tongue and tribe and nation everywhere around the earth. Maybe we're at the midpoint, so maybe communication's bad. You know, how many of the satellite systems are working? You know, how many telephone lines are up? How many people get a web connection? You know, maybe it's at the point where it's dark. You know, he's shaking it to the point where every island's been moved out of its place. You know, it's hard to find some of the landmarks and things. The Bible's already told us that so far in the book of Revelation. Maybe it's even hard to travel to take the gospel. Maybe it's harder for the 144,000 to get around. But just before God sends out his wrath, he sends an angel who will cross everyone's path. Proclaiming in the heavens, what would it be like to see that? An angel flying over Trafalgar, you know, up in the sky, proclaiming a message that we can all hear. It's loud enough. It's clear enough that we can hear it proclaimed. And we understand it enough that it leaves us thinking about that. Jesus Christ. It's about him. Who is this guy? You know, preaching this and the same gospel story that I've mocked and made fun of all this time. But what about the beast? This guy is clearly flying. I've never seen the beast fly. I've never seen that. And they're proclaiming this message and to the point where you ask someone else, did you see that? What did you hear? And they begin to talk with and confirm one another. You know, the Bible says it doesn't care who proclaims the message as long as it goes forth. Ray Comfort, you know, a public street preacher. He talks about one lady that he'd witnessed to countless times. And then one day, he shows up to preach on the street, and she's like, Ray, I got saved by the preaching yesterday. He's like, oh, great. That's wonderful. He's like, wait a minute. We weren't here yesterday. We were in a different place. Who was preaching? He goes, oh, that one guy that mocks and made fun of you who stood up, and he was imitating you preaching the gospel. And he did it with such venom and such hatred in his mouth. He said, repent and trust in God, and you can have all this. He said, I don't know things you did, but he did it in a very mocking way. He said, it really caught me off guard. I finally listened and I saw the love and compassion in which you said it and I got saved. Even though someone was up mocking the gospel, saying it that way, God still used it in proclaiming the gospel and preaching it in that way. God always has a witness. Amy was sharing, we passed out some This Was Your Life tracks. And Amy Compton was talking about being at the Boston Marathon when the bomb went off. Her family was all standing around there. Supposed to meet her at the finish line. At the last minute, she said, I'm too tired. Can you meet me over here? So as her family gathers, takes a shortcut through an alley, the bombs go off. But her husband was like, her dad got saved by that same track. He says, it's become one that we like to pass out. He goes, we passed out several thousand tracks that day at the Boston Marathon as a family, waiting for Amy and watching her run. We passed out these tracks. He said, one of the pictures in one of the newspapers showed a foot. laying on the sidewalk, but right next to it was one of the tracks that we had handed out. You know, that God had a witness up to the last minute, even to these people that died at the Boston Marathon. God's proclamation of his message is amazing. But these guys are saying, did you hear that? And then just in case they weren't sure and they couldn't remember exactly, you know the evening news is going to be like, Today, around the world, everyone hears this and they show the footage, all the cell phone footage of these angels flying around proclaiming the message. Again, proclaiming the gospel on the Beast Network, proclaiming it around the world. Probably BNN, Beast Network News. And so they're proclaiming it out there. The gospel gets heard again. And so a loving plea, repent and trust in Jesus Christ. The hour of his wrath has come. The hour of his judgment's about ready to be poured out. What we've been through so far is the first half, the relative peace and safety. What's about to come in the rest of this tribulation is going to be horrible. So yeah, for three and a half years, it's going to be horrible. And yet God gives one last plea. I'm glad we have a God of second chances that shows it. I could testify it time and time again for me. I could testify what I see in our community and with people. Second chances, second chances, another chance, you didn't hear, pay attention now. I'm glad we're not like a one and done. We have a God who gives you, who's long-suffering, not willing that any should perish, but all should come to repentance. So here, even at the worst of times, during the worst of circumstances, with the worst of people, after they've watched people disappear off the earth, they've seen graves open, you know, these people have all lived through the rapture, they know and they see that, and they now have an angel proclaiming the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. God reaching out for them before he pours out his wrath. That's there and then. We are here and now. More than likely, we're just in front of the rapture. When's the rapture? It's imminent. No man knows the day or the hour. We can see the signs. We see the things that the Bible talks about. We see those shadows being cast forward. We've seen the month of January, you know, fires, diseases, and peace agreements, and things going on. So man, we're right here. So we're just in front of the rapture. That's the event where he's gonna take the church out of here. How are we doing with the Great Commission? How are we doing with the job that he left us with? How are we doing with the go ye into all the world and preach the gospel? It's a good time to reflect as we read about this 144,000 that sing a song and the things that they've done for him and the exploit that they've had. It's a good time for us while it's still now, while it's still here. to ask ourselves, what are we doing? How are we doing? Before it's too late, before we are gone and we don't have anything to offer the Lord in service. If you're here this morning and you've repented and trusted Christ as your savior, you have a job. You have the good news of the gospel to share. That's not just for the preachers. It's not just for the evangelists. It's just not for the Sunday school teachers and the deacons. That's something he gives every one of us. In Matthew 25, Jesus tells a parable that we know is the parable of the talents. And he tells a story that in light of all this that we've just been talking about becomes clear and obvious what he's talking about. So parables or these stories are kind of a comparison. They're kind of hidden from the world to understand, but the Christians can read it and we perceive things and he uses very similar idioms through to kind of teach us and show us the way. And in this one it starts out with a man who goes off and travels to a far country for an undisclosed amount of time. I dare say that's Jesus. goes away to a far country for an undisclosed amount of time. We don't know when he's going to return. We don't know the hour. We don't know the day. But his kingdom's here and so he leaves his servants in charge. I would say that's the church. He leaves first his disciples, and it's now trickled down to you and me. We are the representatives of Christ here on the earth. He leaves it to us. And he gives us all a job to do. Some of us have different abilities, and so some of us have different responsibilities. It says in that parable, he says, some he gives five talents, some four, three, two, and some of them he only gives one talent. Each according to his several ability, he gives them to him. He doesn't take the one who has the one talent and then hold them to the same account as the one who has the five talent. But he has them out there, and he tells them, leaves this in their charge. But then he comes back. or in a day and hour they didn't expect. And they have to give an account. And he sits down with each and every one of them, and he starts with the one with five talents and says, what have you done with that five talents? He says, I took it out, and I made another five talents, and so now I have 10. Well done, thou good and faithful servant. Enter thou into the joy of the Lord. You know, he gets to serve with him. He showed himself faithful while the master was away. He did the master's business. He upheld the great commission, and he did what he was supposed to do. I say the talent's probably the gospel of Jesus Christ. Good news, the story of you. You're like, well, maybe I'm not very good at telling it. Can you tell your story? Can you tell about the day you were saved? Can you tell how you were lost and now you're found? I can tell you mine. I can tell you several people's here because I've heard it. And it's always miraculous to see what God has done, how he's transformed a life, how he reached through and saves you. God transforming lives. The world can't argue with that. A transformed life. I was once like this. Now I'm like this. Jesus Christ has transformed me. He saved me. He made me into a new creation. Took out my heart of stone, gave me a heart of flesh. What have we done with it? I don't want to be that guy with the one talent. He says, Lord, I was afraid I'd mess it up. I was afraid I'd do it wrong. So I hid it, and I buried it. And here, here's my untarnished gospel. I'm back to you. I can tell it to you. It's there. And he says, whoa, take this from him and give it to someone else. You're going to have to hold accountable for what you've done. Man, who are we? Who are we in that story? Are we the guy with the five, with the four, with the one? Have we hidden it? Have we shared our testimony with anyone? If you haven't, do it. Today's the day, now's the time. We don't know what tomorrow holds for us. Let's be busy about sharing the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. You're like, well, I'm not very eloquent and I can't do it. I try to keep us a supply of tracks. Here's a million-dollar bill. And Einstein on the front of it, it's a good one to say, hey, have you got your million dollars today? Or here's your first million. I heard it's the hardest one. Now your second million will come easier. And I usually get a little chuckle or something like that. I bought a whole bunch of other IQ tests that are out there, some new ones to try. Try those. It takes you through a little thing if you're like just even nervous. The way I've been doing it, the restaurant workers are like, hey, here's something you can read on your break. Oh, OK, thanks. And they go on, what do you want? And so they have it in their pocket. Who knows when they're going to see it later? Will they see it on their break? I know I've given the scratch off one before to White Castle. And they've been like, oh, yeah, we have that one in our break room. We've been reading it back there. It's been laying for a while. Good, it's still working. And so it's still there. Pass out some tracks. I feel like I'd be terrified to hand a track to somebody. Kroger has aisles in it. There's not always people and you can shove it in beer cases Guilty you can put it in pants pockets. You can put it mannequins hands guilty. We've done that before It was always kind of nice to go on Coles and like oh Someone's been here. They're holding the gospel track in their hand so you can give it that way pass about that way Can you share a link? Can you write a blog post do a vlog post on it talk about it in this way? Can you maybe write a note send a card? Type an email. We have so many options to us to be able to share the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It doesn't have to all be one. We're not all called to stand up and flap our lips like me. You know, and so we all have our different abilities and our different ways, the different one-on-ones. There's camp in the summer. If you've never been to volunteer at camp, you have an opportunity. We have kids down there who are looking for someone to mentor them, a chance to come alongside and share the gospel with people who are cut off from the world for a week to be able to hear the good news of the gospel. They are there for that reason, to hear that, to study it and to grow and to come alongside and be a part of that team. Maybe that's something you could do this summer. I'm looking for cabin leaders. I'm looking at boys camp around July 4th, Megan and Adam. When are you, after July 4th? Yeah, so the week after July 4th there. So there's at least two camps. We have child's camp that comes up around the fair time there. So we have We got connections. We can get you in down there if you want to work at the camp. We have our missionaries that we pray for, that we support, that we're able to help in that way. And so when we give, it goes towards that. We have many different ways. You can help the Lord's Locker. You can help a great adventure club. They put the gospel out there. I know she always needs some workers there. They have usually 75 kids or something like that. Need some adults around there holding the fort down. So we have opportunity there. You have RU. We meet up every Friday night. Just come alongside. You're like, I don't know. Just come be there. Be a smiling face that these hurting and struggling people need to see. And then you'll have your heart knit with their heart. And you begin to pray for them and care for them. And then wanting to see them succeed. There's a good fishing hole right here in Trafalgar. We can go and do that. We can minister to the lost in this area. You know, a whole bunch of ways we could do it. So I challenge you to take heart. Examine yourself and say, where am I in this? Am I doing enough? Do you really want to stand before our Lord? And he says, what have you done? Who all did you share your testimony with? I wasn't very good. I was afraid I'd say, worship a cow. I don't think you're going to go that bad, right? I don't think you're going to mess it up that much. You can tell about what happened to you. I'm lost. I asked Jesus to save me. He saved me. It doesn't have to be super elaborate. It doesn't have to be anything. Jesus Christ did it. He transformed me. I challenge you to share your testimony. I challenge you to witness to someone this week. You want some excitement in your life? Don't go tie a rubber band on your leg and jump off a cliff. You know, don't have to go climb up some rock face or swim something. Open your mouth for Jesus Christ. You want to get your blood pumping? You know, here's the nervous beforehand. I think God's wanting me to witness to him. I don't know. Maybe he's going to come. Mom was just talking about that this week. There's somebody that she thought she needed to witness to, thought she was going to talk to. Walks away. I don't know. Turns back around and they're still there. Gets an opportunity. Ends up being a good witness encounter. And the people loved it. And I'd like to use the opportunities there. And so, yeah, you want to get your blood pumping. You want to get your prayer life alive. You want to have a close communication with your Savior. Witness for Him. Witness for him. You'll examine yourself. You'll make sure you're right. Lord, is there any wicked thing in me? I want to speak and give you the truth. You want to talk about having good conversation with yourself in the car? Oh, maybe my co-worker at work today. I'm going to wait. They always ask me how my weekend is. And I can say, well, we went to church and we talked about this and this. And you practice. You know how many times I've witnessed my co-workers on the way into work? Not as many times as I've actually witnessed them. But I've practiced that many times. And so when the day comes, it's like, oh, I got a groove I can run on because I've thought about these things. I've been down this line. I've had that thought. You know, God judges the motives of your heart as well as your actions. If your desire is to do that, he put that desire in you, now act upon it. It's also our marching orders going into all the world and preach the gospel. Maybe that coworker, that neighbor, that stranger at Walmart or at the gas station, maybe they have a loved one at home who's witnessed to them and witnessed to them, who's been praying for them. Maybe they're in addictions. Maybe they're not in addictions and they're just turned away from what they've been taught. And they're sick of hearing it from their family. They're sick of hearing it from that preacher. They're sick of hearing it from them. You know, they're not sick of hearing it from you. But maybe you're that one that comes along. You know how many times it's been? Like my grandpa believed that same thing. My mom prays for me every day. I have an aunt who raised me up in the church. Be the answer to their prayer. Be that other witness that comes alongside. Because I'm sure you have some lost family member that you wish someone would witness to. So be that for you, you know, for them. Be that answer to prayer. That's pretty cool to think about, that you can be an answer to prayer for somebody. You can share the good news of the gospel to them. So challenge it. If you want any other ways, if you're not found a tract style that you like yet, I'll order some more. There's a lot of different ones. I get ones that seem interesting to me, and I try to get some different and diverse ones. I'll try even further. We'll try even more to get it in your hand. So now it's up to us. Now's the time. Now's the time for us to do it, to proclaim his message, share our testimony. Because this is the song we're supposed to sing, right? Redeemed how I love to proclaim it. Redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. Restored by His infinite mercy. His child and forever I am. So yeah, we want to redeem. We want to proclaim it. We want to tell. Go tell it on the mountain. Go shout it from the hilltops. You know, we're to do that. And so let's let our testimony so shine. We're to be the lighthouse. The lighthouse that's out there shining in the good news. Our light's not under a bushel. No, we're not gonna let Satan spit it out. We're gonna proclaim it. We're gonna tell that good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so I encourage you to do so. If you don't know him as Savior, today's the day. Now's the time. No one's guaranteed tomorrow. We're never promised the next day. There's nothing like, well, when I see the rapture, or well, when I see him making us take the mark of the beast. Why would you wait that long? I'll wait until the angel flies in the sky. You know the chances of you making it there? You know how many people die up until this point in the tribulation? You're a fool. Today's the day. Now's the time. Consider your ends. Measure yourself against the Ten Commandments. Have you ever lied? Have you ever lusted? Have you ever not obeyed your parents? You ever forgot the Sabbath day to keep it holy? Is there ever a time where you forgot, that one time you forgot to put God first instead of yourself first? How about there was that one time I might have put God first and I always put myself first the rest of the time. That shows us our sinfulness. The Ten Commandments are not ten suggestions. They're also not ten ways of showing yourself to be righteous. They are a mirror that show us our sinfulness. If you find yourself to be a sinner, you're agreeing with God. He says none are righteous, no not one. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. But praise be the gift of God's eternal life through Jesus Christ. If you would repent of your sins, see yourself a sinful, turn your back on those sins, and trust in the finished work of Jesus Christ to save you, you can be saved. You don't have to clean up your life. You don't have to clean up your mouth. You don't have to stop what you were doing. You just need to come to him humbly and say, Lord, save me. He will do the work in you. He will get the glory. He does the transforming power. It's nothing we can do within ourselves, because if it is, we would be able to boast. No, he will boast in your life and what you've done. So I'd ask you, I'd plead with you this morning to repent and trust in Him, trust in Jesus Christ as Savior.